T H E • C O L O R A D O • M A G A Z I N E
Sep. 1924 • Miles from the main thoroughfare of travel and the routes frequented by the throngs of tourists, yet plainly in view from the broad stretches of wonderfully fertile Sand Luis in Colorado with its many prosperous homes, lies a marvelous desert of shifting sands.
 Clearly silhouetted against the western slopes of the rugged Sangre de Cristo range of mountains, these glistening hills of sand appear so near that the unwary traveler is tempted to reach them by an afternoon stroll, but the miles and miles of intervening sand plain and dunes make the approach from this direction really quite difficult. The venture, however, is well worth much more than the trouble it costs.
 In some respects, they are more remarkable than the great deserts or Sahara of Gobi, for this desert seems so unnatural and out of place in the midst of this fertile region. How came these great mountains of almost pure white sand in this region, what were their origins, are questions that have puzzled the traveler and scientist alike.
The desert proper covers an area of nearly eighty square miles, and it is bordered on the south and west by a region of sand plain and dunes of ever greater extent. Seen from a distance, the desert has the appearance of a low lying range of hills of greyish white, outlined sharply against the green forested slopes of the mountain range. It is sometimes mistaken for a bank of snow or clouds when seen in an uncertain light...
 HAT SO LITTLE IS KNOWN of them seems remarkable when one remembers that they were first seen by white men three and a quarter centuries ago, when Juan de Zaldivar led his band of explorers, in 1599, up the Rio Grande river and over the Sangre de Cristo mountains into the Great Plains from the second oldest settlement in the United States.
Lieut. Zebulon Pike was struck by their vastness and wonderful beauty as he viewed them from the top of the Sangre de Cristo mountain pass, in that truly remarkable journey of exploration in 1807, in which he took possession of the country and raised the first American flag in the Rocky Mountain region.
Fremont and Capt. Gunnison, too, were greatly impressed with their unique and striking appearance as they passed them in their trans-continental explorations in the forties and fifties.
When the railroads were built into the San Luis Valley in the early seventies, they were constructed over passes some distance from the sandy desert. Thus left far from the iron highways, interest in them began to wane. The ordinary tourist does not relish the long arduous climb that has been necessary to reach them on horseback or by slow plodding team; however, at the present time one may reach a point about two miles from their margin by auto.
To the real lover of nature in her more wonderful moods, which can only be found in these out-of-the-way places, these difficulties but add zest to the adventure...
Our curiosity is naturally aroused as to the causes which led to the building up of these mountains of sand at the foot of these timber-clad ranges whose peaks of granite are covered with snow nearly the entire year. Surely no erosion from them has furnished the material for these miles of drifting sands; for, counting in eons, the Sangre de Cristo range is comparatively recent in origin and its sharply outlined peaks show little signs of erosion.
The most plausible explanation seems to be that the great inland plateau called the San Luis Valley was once a vast lake. Then, due to gradual tilting of the earth’s crust, the water began to overflow the ridge to southward. Thousands of years of this flow has caused a great chasm to be cut through this basalt ridge through which the Rio Grande river now flows. The gradual drying of the lake left a broad sandy waste over which winds of a thousand years have been blowing. The sweep of these winds, generally from the southwest, has carried these sands yard after yard and mile after mile until they have reached this recess of the mountain range.
Sometimes it was the gentle breezes which carried the fine particles along - at other times the fiercer gales hurled the larger pebbles forward until all reached this final destination, where they have been piled in great white ridged and sharp peaks which reach an elevation of almost a thousand feet above the level of the valley.
The stronger winds have lifted the finer dust high into the air and carried it over the high mountain ranges, where it has built up a soil of wonderful fertility in the famous Wet Mountain valley.
Thus it is that these hills are of pure sand with little admixture of dust or humus.
 The rapid heating and cooling of the layers of air above this glistening waste produces many remarkable phenomena. Mirages and looms are common. To the westward a few miles are real lakes which may be seen from the higher ridges, but, so confused are these with the illusions of beautiful lakes surrounded by trees, that the eye cannot distinguish the real from the fancied.
Sometimes the stunted cedars, making their unsuccessful fight against the encroaching sands at the edge of the desert, are seen growing so unnaturally tall that they seem ghostly. Sometimes these illusory scenes are painted against the clouds and at others upon the mountain side. Then again, they may be suspended in the air...
In some places the winds have literally scooped great depressions between the ridges, whose bottoms are marshy, and where scant vegetation may be found growing. There is a coarse grass with long fibrous roots, together with some rapidly growing flowering plants. On even the dry ridges, plants are found with long string-like roots which run along the ground for as much as twenty feet, sending down rootlets every few inches along the way. When the wind blows the sand from these roots, as it often does, the ridges appear to be covered by giant spider webs.
T R E E S
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SAND VICTIMS
On the border of the desert, junipers and scrub pinons are making a gallant but losing fight against these ever-shifting sands. In many places only the tops of trees may be seen above the ridges. A little while longer and the struggle will be over. The relentless sands will have swallowed up its victims for aye. Such are the grim tragedies of Nature in this desert land...
Some time in the eons to come, these mountains of sand will probably form a part of the western slope of the lofty Sangre de Cristo range, but, for many years, they will form the wonder of the scientist and traveler. One involuntarily searches among the long ridges of shimmering sand for the Arab caravan which was the invariable accompaniment of the desert scenes with which we are familiar.
Sometimes, seen from the valley below, in the early rays of the rising sun, they are bathed in a beautiful crimson glow; sometimes, when the clouds are flitting in the sky overhead, they change in color and outline with each vanishing shadow. Seen in the moonlight, each peak and ridge stands out in wonderful contrast and clear profile compared with the deep shadows of the valleys and ravines. Seen in the winter, they lie cold and marble-like in their mantle of glistening snow. But, to see them in their most wonderful aspect and beauty, one must ascend the mountain pass to the eastward and view them in all the glowing colors of the setting sun.
Viewed in any light and at any time this Colorado Desert of shifting sand presents a most interesting and wonderful panorama.
-The Colorado Magazine
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